It is now common to apply cold and compression to a traumatized area of a human body to facilitate healing and prevent unwanted consequences of the trauma. In fact, the acronym RICE (Rest, Ice, Compression and Elevation) is now used by many.
Cold packing with ice bags or the like traditionally has been used to provide deep core cooling of a body part. Elastic wraps are often applied to provide compression.
It will be appreciated that these traditional techniques are quite uncontrollable. For example, the temperature of an ice pack will, of course, change when the ice melts, and it has been shown that the application of elastic wraps and, consequently, the pressure provided by the same, varies considerably even when the wrappers are experienced individuals.
Because of these and other difficulties, many in the field have turned to more complicated animate body heat exchanger. Most effective animate body heat exchangers typically include two major components, an external compliant therapy component covering a body part to be subjected to heat exchange, and a control component for producing a flowing heat exchange liquid. Many control units also produce and supply an air or other gas pressure needed to apply pressure to a body part and to press the heat exchange liquid toward such body part. This air pressure is directed to another compliant bladder of the therapy component, which air pressure bladder overlays the liquid bladder to press such liquid bladder against the body part to be subjected to heat exchange, as well as apply compression to the body part to reduce edema.
As can be seen, a commonly used external therapy component uses a pair of compliant bladders to contain fluids; that is, it preferably has both a compliant bladder for containing a circulating heat exchange liquid and a gas pressure bladder which overlays the liquid bladder for inhibiting edema and for pressing the liquid bladder against the body part to be subjected to heat exchange. One problem is that in many therapy component configurations of this nature, the gas pressure bladder tends to “balloon” or, in other words, expand to a much greater degree than is desired. This unwanted expansion can be the cause of several problems. For one, it can actually pull away from the body part, some or all of the conformal heat exchange bladder. For another, it can reduce its edema inhibition ability, as well as reduce the desired effect of pressing the heat exchange bladder into contact with the body part.
Commonly used external therapy components use hook and loop fastening systems in order to allow the therapy component to be applied to a wide variety of body sizes and to give skilled users maximum flexibility in application. The hook and loop fastener is commonly a permanent and integral part of the therapy component, and can be attached by a variety of means including but not limited to sewing, RF welding, gluing, and heat sealing. There are several problems with the permanent attachment of a hook and loop fastening system to the therapy component. First, forces may resolve disadvantageously when the hook and loop fastener is secured, which can result in peeling the hook and loop fastener open and decreasing effective compression. Second, a sewn assembly is relatively stiff, resulting in less even distribution of compression therapy, as well as a higher probability of folds in the assembly that can cause fluid flow to be cut off as compression increases. Third, the therapy component is typically in direct contact with the skin, but RF welded soft heat exchangers cannot be machine washed making it more difficult to provide sanitary treatment in clinical settings or in rental situations. Finally, hook and loop fasteners have a limited lifetime and when they wear out, the entire therapy component must be scrapped.
There remains a need to provide efficient heat transfer therapy apparatus and methods.